After my last post complaining the end of the season may just be on the horizon, I have to say, the horizon is no closer, but at least we now have options! After winning two games on our home court we are a mere two games from the NBA finals. Unfortunately, the Lakers find themselves in exactly the same situation.

Before I start making congratulatory remarks for the Suns, I have to tip my hat to Kobe Bryant. Jackson effectively played a six man rotation for game four, but it may as well have been a one man rotation. Kobe single-handedly kept the Lakers from being embarrassed in this game. He stayed on the floor for 45 minutes, and for the second game in a row he scored over 35 while dishing out 10 or more assists. This man may as well be inducted into the Hall of Fame right now. Honestly? What are we waiting for?

Those other guys on the Lakers team. Well, they should be putting a portion of their salaries in a tip jar and handing it over to the Big Man on Campus while thanking him for covering their collective asses night in and night out every time they don't feel like showing up.

The Phoenix Suns on the other hand, are mighty different beast all together!

Coming off a victory at home on Sunday that set the Suns up - Big Time - for a run at the Western Conference title, Phoenix has no friends amongst the Vegas odds gurus as we get ready for Tuesday's game against the Lakers.

Looking at the Las Vegas Hilton - home of a giant sports book that handles mega bucks this time of year - we see the Suns being touted as mere 1-point underdogs while all other legal bookies in Nevada are carrying the game as a toss-up.

So the Strip's gurus of legal gaming aren't giving Phoenix the benefit of a home court advantage despite the Suns beating the Lakers by nine points about 24-hours ago in Phoenix. What an insult.

And - as a result - the bookies in Vegas are opening the door for hard core Suns fans to wrack-up some real money by putting a few dineros where their mouths are. So we're recommending that all readers here at www.sunsstufft.com throw a few bucks down on Amar'e Stoudemire and the Guys with the Golden Touch.

Now don't bet the ranch on it - but putting a few surplus bucks on the line wouldn't hurt.

It was a beautiful win as the Suns literally overpowered the LA Lakers with Amar'e Stoudemire leading the charge - and scoring 42 points in a brilliant performance.

Amar'e showed that the proof is in the pudding and that the Suns sure do rank as this year's Underdog of Choice. And by beating LA with a 118-109 score - the Guys from the Valley of the Sun blew past the Vegas odds that had us up by a mere 1.5 points in this home court game.

Despite his understated remarks during the post game Stoudemire's brilliance was a game changer and along with a career high of 42 play-off points, STAT grabbed 11 rebounds and - in a series of offensive plays - he rushed past Pau Gasol with a stutter step that deserves to be patented.

His double-digit busting rebounds included a few in which he bullied the ball away from a chaste LA offense that never hit its full stride. So much for the inside strength of Ron Artest and Lamar Odom - they were just blown away by our Amar'e.

In short - the third game of this Western Conference final proved once again that Amar'e isn't just a run of the mill Western Conference All-Star. No those are way too common in this play-off series.

Instead, Amar'e is an NBA Hall-of-Fame worthy player and deserves that degree of respect from the local crowd.

So put your catcalls on hold - because it's time for cheers/not jeers when it comes to Amar'e and he remains at the heart of the Suns post-Shaq offense.

I have to admit the last two games against the Lakers has been like a stiff jab to the stomach. I've been asking all season long for the Suns to hit the second, third, sixth, or seventh seed spot in the west solely so they could avoid having to play the Lakers until the western conference finals. I knew the Suns would have problems with the Lakers size and comparable speed. Now we're here, having received everything I could have ever wished for, my devious plan executed to perfection, and I'm disappointed with my Phoenix Suns.

The final score just doesn't do the Suns justice - and the stats don't reveal the central role Jared Dudley, Grant Hill and Jason Richardson played in a game we almost won.

For Richardson it was the old scoring machine kicking into high gear to make a dent in the Kobe-led Lakers as he knocked down 27 of the Suns 112 points as Phoenix went down to a closely fought 112-124 defeat in LA on Wednesday night. J-Rich's scoring display included hitting better than 40% from 3-point range as he knocked down three of his seven shots from beyond the arc - proving he is a veteran who knows how to play in the Big Game.

The 37-year old Grant Hill also showed that all of his years in the NBA polished his pro-style as he hit for 23 points by making 10 of 17 from the field. His strong defensive skills also deterred the rampant scoring of LA's Lamar Odom - a key Suns vulnerability in the first game of the series.

But the highlight of the game was the stellar performance of Jason Dudley - a favorite of ours throughout his Suns' tenure - on both ends of the court.

Wow! I was really embarrassed for the way Phoenix came to play last night. Not that I minded losing. I don't expect them to win every game. Certainly not in Staples arena. But to come out and play like you're on the back end of a four games in five days road trip, after getting a week off. I just don't know what to say about that.

Even in the first period when the Suns were up by seven, I did not like their intensity. I felt they were up simply because the Lakers were playing that bad and not because they were playing that good. Very quickly, after that slow start, L.A. confirmed my worst fears. They started shooting lights out, finishing the last five minutes of the first period on an 18-4 run and the Suns never recovered.

Sunsstufft was contacted by NBA.com. They suggested we have a friendly competition with a Lakers blog, With Malice. They also said they'd be putting up the prize package, so how could we refuse? Here is what they asked us to do:

The +/- stat is a statistic that looks at the point differential when players are both in and out of the game, to see how the team performs with various combinations. The +/- stat can look at a variety of combinations including the best two player, three player and even five player combinations for each game. Head over tohttp://youcastcorp.com/c/102/go/index.php?r=74 to play around with the tool. In the comments section, leave your guess for the Top 5 for THE OPPOSING TEAM after Game 1. Answers should be posted by 6pm EST on Monday May 17th. The winner will receive a free prize package courtesy of NBA.com

So post your top five +/- scores for, uhm, your favorite Lakers players in the comments section. Better yet, post who you think will have the best +/-, we don't really want to know your favorites among the enemy.

Forget about a regular season that saw some uneven play - especially during that disheartening December/ January slide.

That's right - just forget about it - because our guys from Phoenix have finally arrived.

Sure the Suns are going up against the dreaded LA Lakers on Monday and it's on their home court. Yes - the Suns are taking the hardwood in LA against the defending NBA champions and we are 6.5 point underdogs over at the Las Vegas Hilton. But don't be troubled dear readers - we've already demolished the San Antonio Spurs and there - to quote the ol'song - "Ain't No Stopping Us Now".

At least not in LA.

Our unbounded optimism - plus a cautious recommendation to take the points and put a couple of honest dollars on the line - is based on the extraordinary play of two veterans who ate the Spurs alive. And did it in style.

Such is the difference between the old Suns and the new Suns. Back in the day, Nash would take an elbow, a knee, a hip, whatever, come out bloodied and have to quickly get patched up so that he could get back in the game before the rest of the team completely loses their focus without him.

What about now? Nash takes an elbow to the eye from Duncan, clearly accidental. Simply the result of a play maker like Nash always having his hand reaching for a piece of the pie, lest he get left without. This time, such ambitiousness gets him sent to the locker room with over six minutes to go in the third period to collect a quick half dozen stitches. He comes back with more than two minutes to go in the period and what is the first thing he does. He sits on the bench with some ice on his eye and calmly waits for the period to end. He's used to sitting out 6-7 minutes per half. What difference does it make if it's the end of the third or the beginning of the fourth period?

For the third time this season the Phoenix Suns donned their Los Suns jerseys and for the third time this season they won. This time beating the Spurs 110-102 to go up in the series two games to none.

Alright, I admit the title is a little deceptive, but I like to think of it as potential foreshadowing for the upcoming game in San Antonio on Friday night. So far, the series has gone according to the plan: Win at home. The Spurs aren't out of it yet, but they are one game away from having their backs against the wall. Actually, for the next two games they'll be playing with that wall just a step or two behind them.

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